Charleston Marches Into Regional Title Game

ELKINS — The Charleston boys have cruised into the 3A Region 1 Tournament championship game while hardly breaking a sweat.

Charleston drilled Elkins 67-33 in the semifinals on Friday to move to the title game at 7:30 p.m. today against West Fork.

"The guys were talking in the locker room before the game, ‘Don’t let them get comfortable on their home floor,’" Charleston coach B.J. Ross said. "I didn’t even have to tell them anything. That’s good senior leadership. They came out and played really hard early and got control of that game."

Charleston led 20-8 at the end of the first quarter and 38-17 at the half. The Tigers continued to dominate in the third, pushing the advantage to 58-27 after three.

GIRLS — Paris jumped on 3A-4 rival Mansfield 17-0 to start the game and led 24-3 before cruising home with a 16-point victory.

Paris (26-5) has beaten Mansfield (17-14) four consecutive times after a bad loss to Mansfield in the Bill Frye Invitational.

"We know Mansfield by now, they are a good team and you have to get after them and be tough and physical," Paris coach Toby Tevebaugh said. "I think we were a little more relaxed than in that first game and we just came out and played well early. The girls kind of took it upon themselves to be tough and physical."

"Matti was able to play tough in the post and open things up a little for Lycia," Tevebaugh said.

Kaylie Pyles led Mansfield (17-14) with 12 points. Mansfield plays today at noon and can get a No. 3 seed at the 3A State Tournament with a win.

West Fork 49, Cedarville 47

BOYS — Cedarville led for almost the entire game, but late mistakes doomed the Pirates.

Cedarville (20-9) led 42-41 with less than two minutes left but missed a pair of free throws and had two turnovers from as West Fork (18-11) pulled off the upset.

Cedarville will play Elkins today in for the No. 3 seed.

"We didn’t execute offensively all game long and made too many mental mistakes," Cedarville coach Andrew Tencleve said. "We are going to have to get mentally tough and come back with a better ball game tomorrow."

GIRLS — In a strange ending to a sluggish game, West Fork made a free throw with no time on the clock in overtime for the win.

Leading by two with 14 seconds left, a West Fork player missed the front end of a 1-and-1 free-throw opportunity. Danville then made a shot at the buzzer to send the game to a second OT.

But after some conferring, the officials said the West Fork shooter should have gotten two shots, not a 1-and-1. They gave West Fork a chance to go back to the line with no time on the clock.

"The director of officials told me the right call, I don’t know," Danville coach Stuart Creamer said. "We’ve been through a big win against Cedarville to get into the state tournaments and now we have a tough loss. It’s all just a good experience to go through all this before state."